Anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rates of any psychiatric condition – 10% of those diagnosed die due to related factors. This eating disorder primarily affects women, especially adolescent girls, struggling with the pressure of today’s society to be thin. The obsessive fear of gaining weight, combined with body image distortion is a deadly lethal mix. It drives individuals to try to control their body weight by voluntary starvation, binge-eating, purging, vomiting and excessive exercise.

When I hear the word anorexia, I usually think of Nicole Ritchie, Lindsey Lohan and the Olsen Twins. Every gossip rag at the supermarket’s check out counter has always some big bold letters announcing which female celebrity is seeking treatment for it. So I was quite surprised when I picked up our local newspaper last week and read about Dennis Quaid and his battle with “manorexia” – the male version of anorexia. Well, well, well…. What do we have here? It seems that the big Hollywood trend of “skin and bones” is not just limited to its female population.

My husband thinks that I have gone off the rocker.

I was just explaining to him my theory on weight gain – slow eaters vs. fast eaters. And the little crazy experiment I had set out to prove my point.

Sometime in November, I had lunch with an old high school buddy of mine. Let’s call him Dave.

Now, Dave is probably the slowest eater you will ever find on the face of this planet. When we have dinner parties at a restaurant, there’s always that contemplation whether to invite Dave or not because if he was invited, dinner could pretty much last about 2 hours longer.